Abstract We summarize experiments at Ecole Normale Supérieure on entanglement, quantum logic, quantum measurement and decoherence performed with photons and atoms in cavities.
After they have interacted, quantum particles generally behave as a single nonseparable entangled system. The concept of entanglement plays an essential role in quantum physics. We have performed entanglement experiments with Rydberg atoms and microwave photons in a cavity and tested quantum mechanics in situations of increasing complexity. Entanglement resulted either from a resonant exchange of energy between atoms and the cavity field or from dispersive energy shifts affecting atoms and photons when they were not resonant. With two entangled particles (two atoms or one atom and a photon), we have realized new versions of the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen situation. The detection of one particle projected the other, at a distance, in a correlated state. This process could be viewed as an elementary measurement, one particle being a ‘‘meter’’ measuring the other. We have performed a ‘‘quantum nondemolition’’ measurement of a single photon, which we detected repeatedly without destroying it. Entanglement is also essential to understand decoherence, the process accounting for the classical appearance of the macroscopic world. A mesoscopic superposition of states (‘‘Schrodinger cat’’) gets rapidly entangled with its environment, losing its quantum coherence. We have prepared a Schrodinger cat made of a few photons and studied the dynamics of its decoherence, in an experiment which constitutes a glimpse at the quantum/classical boundary. We have also investigated entanglement as a resource for the processing of quantum information. By using quantum two-state systems (qubits) instead of classical bits of information, one can perform logical operations exploiting quantum interferences and taking advantage of the properties of entanglement. Manipulating as qubits atoms and photons in a cavity, we have operated a quantum gate and applied it to the generation of a complex three-particle entangled state. We finally discuss the perspectives opened by these experiments for further fundamental studies.
The counter-intuitive aspects of quantum physics have been illustrated for some time by thought experiments, from Einstein's photon box to Schrödinger's cat. These experiments have now become real, with single particles — electrons, atoms or photons — directly unveiling the weird features of the quantum. State superpositions, entanglement and complementarity define a novel quantum logic that can be harnessed for information processing, raising great hopes for applications. This book describes a class of such thought experiments made real. Juggling with atoms and photons confined in cavities, ions or cold atoms in traps, provides an incentive to shed a new light on the basic concepts of quantum physics. Measurement processes and decoherence at the quantum-classical boundary are highlighted.